my life, my thoughts, my world.

So the photo you’re looking at is me actually passing out. In the 10 second delay between pressing the shutter release, and the shutter actually opening, I managed to pass out. This new pillow rocks, thanks Mom! Not only does my back not make me want to raze an entire geographic region when I wake up, but my neck isn’t killing me either. I’ll enjoy it while it lasts. The only problem with this marvelous new pillow is that I sleep like a rock now, even with the loud crowd I live with I’m damn near impossible to wake up. It’s a good thing I can get dressed and be at work in a matter of minutes.

In other news, there isn’t a whole lot going on, and that’s a good thing. For Christmas, I went ahead and bought myself a new toy – in the form of Photoshop CS3. While around $700 for software might induce choking in a number of people, consider this – my OIF3 Christmas present to myself was a $2300 custom 1911. Gimpshop is still nifty, free, and can handle much of what I want to do, but it lacks in areas I simply can’t figure a way around. Photoshop being the “industry standard” has a plethora of tutorials, forums, groups, and other sources of instruction available for free. When I was spinning a wrench for a living, I could have done the job with bargain bin tools from Wal-Mart, but I instead elected to buy the right tools for the job and ended up with a mix of Craftsman Professional, and Snap-On (and some MAC, and Matco.) Same deal here, I’ve got my RAW workflow solidly worked out in Bibble Pro, but post-processing in Gimpshop leaves something to be desired. On to Photoshop I go.

Not being able to remember if I said this yet, I’ll say it now (again, possibly.) Texas State University can expect my attendance starting Fall 2008, with a Mass Communications (Print Journalism) major, and a Photography minor. I’m pretty excited about the whole moving on with my life thing, and pleasantly surprised that there are actually nice homes in the South Austin/San Marcos area that I can afford. That’s about it for now.

To all my family, friends, and everyone else – Merry Christmas. Next year, I’ll be around to say it in person to most of you. This year, I’ll put another notch in my Christmas-away-from-home belt. Thanks to everyone that’s sent things out here over the course of this deployment, you’ve made a real difference in my comfort level, and my men and I all appreciate it a lot. Enjoy the holidays, and again Merry Christmas.

Not perfect mind you, but my cough is mostly gone and I’m not sneezing every four seconds. Yesterday, I had the pleasure of sitting through the Sergeant Major of the Army do his best to rationalize the irrational. A bit of an official Army comedy tour in my opinion, though the laughter was all on the inside. Granted, the real reason I was at the chow hall well after I’m usually in bed, was the presence of some of the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders. The SMA speech very nearly caused me to miss a photo-op and my chance at an autograph, but fortunately I know people that know people that drive people places. Even though the event was officially over, I still got my autographs and a quick photo. Too bad we lost to the Eagles in what may have been the worst football game I can ever recall watching. Jessica, dear, try not to distract your boy-toy (aka our QB) during the playoffs. Ring number 6 would be a lovely addition. Feel free to distract everyone on the Patriots though, I’d greatly appreciate it.

Just a quick update, since I’ve been lazy with this lately. I woke up Wed. night before my shift started feeling much like I’d been run over by garbage truck. Most of Thursday was spent immobilized in my sleeping bag, save for the opportunity to accomplish tasks related to bodily functions – to include puking out all the water I’d previously consumed in an attempt to stave off dehydration. By Friday, I was at least able to move without the onset of an incredibly shitty headache, and even completed another 12 hour shift of doom. Right now I don’t feel entirely horrible, though I’ve certainly felt better many times in the past. Hopefully when I wake up, I’ve kicked whatever vile pestilence has infected my upper respiratory tract out of my body and can resume life “as normal.” The end.

So I haven’t really blogged much lately, and there’s a half decent reason. Doing the whole blog-from-work thing is all but impossible right now, though it may be possible again at some point in the future, and for a while the internet center was broken too. Kind of makes it impossible to do things like maintain a blog. Combine that with the fact that I’ve been going to the gym again, playing more with my camera, and even writing a few new songs, and you run out of hours in the day.

Anyway, everything is going as well as can be expected. I’m looking forward to going to Texas State when I get back, and hopeful that my photography business works out well. Recently I’ve taken to using Inkscape to make some lighting diagrams for shot concepts I’ve come up with, and even broke out a pencil and some paper to try my hand at sketching the scenes. The latter required some research, as the last time I took anything resembling an art class I’m pretty sure I lived in Midland, TX – and that was way over a decade ago. The way I figure it, if I can see it in my head, I should be able to transfer that to paper. At least it would be nice if I find myself having that ability.